Monday, April 27, 2009

Remember this. (this is not a poem)

tic..tic..tic.tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka-tic-ka...

film is running
you're at the back of the class
wondering,
Why is the pledge of allegiance necessary to my education?
Really wondering;
thinking about George Washington and his slaves

but you're actually at work
thinking all that.
You wonder why you didn't ask more questions as a child.
You get mad, but only resentfully so - mad at yourself.

A caterpillar is inching up the bark of a tree - an American Elm.
Each second is 24 pictures.
60 now, if it's in HD.
Maybe more.
So when you saw your sister careen over the handlebars of your bike,
and you wish you could not let her ride it,
maybe there was something you didn't see.
A green devil poking his finger into the spokes,
or an angel lifting the life out of her body like a fish on a hook right before impact.
The caterpillar doesn't get to finish it's climb before the director cuts it off.

Occasionally, Bismarck, North Dakota, experiences something along the lines of something in Afghanistan or Darfur. Brains pick up memories in secret places - sometimes losing them like quarters in the couch - and when we find them again, they are like new and totally useable. Sometimes, I think it's good to forget.

Still,
my calendar speaks
regularly. Only one song
it sings forever.

Remember this.

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